High Court Issues Notices To Punjab Govt, Speaker On Opposition Leader's Plea Alleging Biased Telecast Of State Assembly Proceedings

The Punjab and Haryana High Court today issued notice on a plea filed by Punjab's opposition leader Pratap Singh Bajwa, alleging biased telecast of the State Assembly proceedings.

Bajwa alleged that during Assembly's Live Telecast, the camera is unfocussed when opposition MLAs are speaking and the entirety of their speech is not shown, whereas the telecast is very clear when members of the ruling party are speaking.

A division bench of Acting Chief Justice Ritu Bahri and Justice Nidhi Gupta has issued notices to the State government, the Speaker and the Assembly's Secretary.

Bajwa submitted in the petition that when the ruling party members are speaking, the camera is focused and the entirety of the audio is picked up as well as "camera is zoomed into the AAP speaker" to make it clear who is speaking. He has also annexed various shots of the Vidhan Sabha stating that it showcases the unequal treatment towards the opposition.

MLAs of the opposition and MLAs of the government are both representatives of their respective constituency, hence the discrimination trickles down to subjecting their constituents to discrimination, the plea contends.

Previously, the Court had enquired as to who is responsible to run the live broadcast. "...is it a private company or someone else? Is there any statute under which it is governed?"

The petitioner today submitted that as per the RTI response received by him, "The live telecast of the proceedings of the Punjab Vidhan Sabha is arranged by the Department of Information and Public Relations, Government of Punjab, Chandigarh with the permission of Honb'le Speaker, Punjab Vidhan Sabha."

"The Punjab Legislative Assembly has not yet framed any rules, instructions and guidelines regarding Live Telecast of the proceedings of House till date," added the RTI reply.

It was also stated that information regarding expenditure on broadcasting of virtual proceedings in Punjab Vidhan Sabha may be obtained from the Information and Public Relations Department, Punjab. "No expenses are incurred by Vidhan Sabha Secretariat for this purpose."

High Court has taken the RTI response on record and asked the State to file its response in 4 weeks.

Advocate Arshpreet Kadial appeared for the petitioner.

Case Title: Pratap Singh Bajwa v. State of Punjab.